The Green Files > Study shows eutrophic lakes may not recover for a millennium

[Biology News Net - Current events, News and Articles in Biology] According to the study, industrial agriculture, with its reliance on phosphorus-rich fertilizers, is the primary source of much of the excess nutrients responsible for fouling lakes. In rich farming areas, like southern Wisconsin, the routine application of chemical fertilizers and phosphorus-laden manure, has resulted in the gradual accumulation of phosphorus in the soil, which, ultimately, has nowhere to go but into the streams, lakes and rivers of the watershed where it is applied.

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Some slightly related from Technorati and Google.

[Lauraerickson.com] Laura's Bird Conservation Notes: Reducing Nutrient Runoff: When fertilizers and other nutrients run off from our lawns and gardens, they contribute to the excessive nutrient load (eutrophication) of lakes, rivers, and streams, and cause dead zones in oceans. When these nutrients seep through the soil into groundwater or run off into storm sewers or freshwater drinking sources, they can contaminate our own drinking water. Commercial fertilizers run off or percolate through soil more quickly than compost and don’t foster healthy soil organisms and soil moisture retention as compost does.

[Scienceblog.com] Science Blog -- Insects caught in a nutrient-poor food web: Elser and his collaborators gathered reams of data on the chemical composition of plants and animals from previously published studies. Their literature search yielded information on 501 land plants such as trees and grasses, algae and other microscopic organisms from 226 lakes, 130 species of terrestrial insects like butterflies and grasshoppers, and 43 species of planktonic crustaceans (tiny insect-like animals that inhabit the water column).

[Greenviewfertilizer.com] About Greenview Fertilizer Online | Lebanon Seaboard Corporation ...: If you think this is far fetched you should know these are all scenarios that currently exist in the new world of nutrient regulation. Proliferation of regulation makes doing our job harder and could even reach a point where our ability to maintain turf is severely impaired. Assess the threat from a political viewpoint and it’s easy to see that the lawn fertilizers and the landscape industry are among a handful of highly visible targets for regulation.

[Psychcentral.com] Lake - Enpsychlopedia: Nutrient poor lakes are said to be oligotrophic, and are generally clear, having a low concentration of plant life. Mesotropic lakes have good clarity and an average level of nutrients. Eutrophic lakes are enriched with nutrients, resulting in good plant growth and possible algal blooms.

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